The war between former Vice President Al Gore and his critics over global warming is about to hit the boiling point with a new claim that Sun-influenced climate change is shifting into reverse, with the Earth poised to head into a period of cooling that will end the rise of the oceans.

A global warming critic on Monday announced plans to release new data showing that the threat of rising global sea levels has peaked and that the Sun is entering a “hibernation” period that could bring colder weather.

“Like most major climate events, the past sea level rise was caused by the Sun and had little or nothing to do with mankind’s industrial greenhouse gas emissions,” said John Casey, a former White House and NASA advisor and climate author. “Now that the Sun has entered a state of ‘solar hibernation’ and is cutting back on the energy by which it warms the Earth, a new and potentially dangerous decades-long drop in global temperatures has begun,” he warned.

Casey is the president of the Space and Science Research Corporation and author “Cold Sun,” which predicts the coming cooling period. Because his predictions go against the mainstream, he has been ridiculed by supporters of global warming. Media Matters called him a “scam artist.”